You can see the temptation. You have an almost 250-year-old comedy with antique language and an obsession with gossip that could concern nobody but the idle rich. Why wouldn’t you try to jazz it up a bit?
That seems to have been the thinking of director Seán Aydon in this laboured touring production for Tilted Wig. Rather than trust Richard Brinsley Sheridan’s play to be funny on its own terms, he soups up the opening scenes with so much overstated clowning they verge on unintelligible.
It looks gorgeous thanks to Sarah Beaton’s 1950s set and costume design, infused with a Kodachrome warmth in its saturated pinks, oranges and blues. And when the actors strike fashion-magazine poses, all angular arms and extended legs, they add to the period glamour.
But when the poses become locked, the actors turn into cartoon grotesques, barking out their lines to EMPHASISE every OTHER word as if to shriek the comedy into life. It is hard to listen to and, worse, it flattens Sheridan’s wit. All the precisely coordinated choreography under movement director Stephen Moynihan counts for nothing.
You would blame the cast if only the same actors did not go on to prove themselves rather good when doubling in the principal roles. There is still too much shouting, but once they stop trying so hard, the production settles down into a modestly amusing romp of romantic subterfuge and mistaken identity.
Joseph Marcell, the one actor who does not double, is also one of the least emphatic and easiest on the ear. Playing Sir Peter Teazle, the elderly gentleman hoping in vain to keep his new young wife under his thumb, he has the air of a man who is constantly one step behind. Lydea Perkins as that wife is very much on the front foot, not even pretending to care for him as she fritters away his fortune. She is elegant and disarmingly frank.
Strong too is Tony Timberlake as Sir Oliver, the wealthy uncle of reprobate brothers Charles and Joseph (Garmon Rhys and Alex Phelps) who keep up a suave appearance even as their panic escalates. A late return of the overblown supporting characters makes you admire their subtlety all the more.
• At Theatre by the Lake, Keswick, until 16 March. Then touring until 8 June
